Looking for a job? Try health care, finance

A survey of almost 280 Central Florida companies indicates that hiring in some of the region's biggest industries will come to a virtual standstill this year as businesses weather the worst economic storm since the Great Depression.

Construction and travel companies, for example, plan to add almost no new employees, according to the survey by OrlandoJobs.com. Media companies expect to hire fewer than 10 people.

Meanwhile, the jobs that do open up -- in industries such as health care and banking -- will reward candidates with specialized skills. With so many people looking for work, companies won't bother to advertise openings, meaning job seekers will need to be working the grapevine.

"Job seekers today are programmed to go to Web sites, but this is going back to word of mouth," said Roger Lear, president of the placement site OrlandoJobs.com. "If you're not out there networking hard, you just won't see these jobs."

Lear speaks from personal experience. His wife has been looking for work for a few months. Recently, she began poking around the Web site for Burnham Institute for Medical Research and found positions for which she was suited.

Those slots, Lear said, had never been posted on the most popular job sites.

"Twelve months ago, all of those would have been posted," said Lear, whose firm surveyed 277 companies during the last two weeks of January. "But there are so many people looking now, companies don't have to do that."

More than 750,000 people are out of work in the Sunshine State, and the jobless rate stands at 8.1 percent -- the highest in 16 years and almost 1 percentage point higher than the national average.

The OrlandoJobs.com survey found that regional companies expect to hire about 9,400 people this year. More than 3,000 of those will be in the health-care sector, one of the few areas expected to grow.

The hospitality industry expects to hire about 3,000 people, and the banking and finance industry projects it will hire about 1,200. Those figures represent a combination of new positions and vacancies that will have to be filled.

At the other end of the scale, advertising and travel companies say they'll hire just a dozen people, and media outlets report they'll hire just six. Construction companies, battered by the downturn, estimate they'll hire 32 people -- a little more than two for each of the 15 companies included in the survey.

During the economic boom, construction companies were one of the biggest financial engines and were routinely hiring carpenters, electricians, crew chiefs and unskilled laborers.

Miguel Aviles has worked in construction for decades both here and in Puerto Rico. But he's now working part time as a security guard because builders aren't hiring.

"I've tried very hard," Aviles said during a recent trip to Workforce Central Florida, the state's job service center. "There's nothing out there."

The outlook is better for job seekers with special skills in areas such as physical therapy, nursing and computer programming. Companies said they'll also be looking at clients with experience -- and talent -- in sales as they try to keep money coming in during the recession.

Lear said he didn't find the "doom and gloom" he expected to hear from many companies. Most remain hopeful the economy will stabilize, allowing them to fill open positions. For job seekers, though, the environment will remain difficult because recruiters know that in many fields they have the pick of the litter.

"Jobs still exist, but the competition is extraordinary," Lear said. "Companies can be very, very picky right now."